The highly anticipated U.S.-China trade deal is “done,” U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday, after negotiators from both countries agreed on a framework to remove Chinese export restrictions on rare earth minerals and other critical industrial components.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump announced some details of the deal that emerged from two days of talks held in London, noting that the deal is “subject to final approval with President xi and me.”
“Full magnets, and any necessary rare earths, will be supplied, up front, by China. Likewise, we will provide to China what was agreed to, including Chinese students using our colleges and universities (which has always been good with me!),” Trump added.
U.S. to impose 55 percent tariff on China
The president also revealed that the U.S. will be getting a total of 55 percent tariffs while China will get 10 percent.
A White House official said the 55 percent tariff represents the sum of a baseline 10 percent reciprocal tariff Trump has imposed on goods imported from almost all U.S. trading partners, and 20 percent on all Chinese imports due to measures Trump had imposed on China, Mexico and Canada associated with the flow of the opioid fentanyl into the U.S.
Finally, the tariff includes pre-existing 25 percent levies on imports from China that were put in place during Trump’s first term in the White House. The framework for applying the latest U.S.-China trade deal is yet to be revealed.
The U.S. president later said: “President XI and I are going to work closely together to open up China to American trade. This would be a great WIN for both countries!!!”
Read: World Bank cuts global growth forecast to 2.3 percent for 2025 on increased trade tensions
Agreement to remove export restrictions from both nations
Officials from the U.S. and China met in London starting on Monday following a call last week between Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping. The two countries had reached a previous deal in Geneva, which fell through over China’s continued curbs on critical minerals exports, prompting the Trump administration to respond with export controls preventing shipments of semiconductor design software, aircraft and other goods to China.
U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said the U.S.-China trade deal would remove restrictions on Chinese exports of rare earth minerals and magnets, and some of the recent U.S. export restrictions “in a balanced way,” but did not provide details after the talks concluded.
In another briefing, China’s Vice Commerce Minister Li Chenggang also said a trade framework had been reached in principle that would be taken back to U.S. and Chinese leaders.
The deal comes at a time when Trump’s tariff policies raise concerns over global economic growth and trade. The World Bank on Tuesday cut its global growth forecast for 2025 to 2.3 percent, noting that higher tariffs and heightened uncertainty posed a “significant headwind” for almost all economies in the world.
The bank also expected global trade to grow by 1.8 percent in 2025, down from 3.4 percent in 2024 and around a third of its 5.9 percent level in the 2000s. Despite lowering its global growth forecast, the World Bank said the risk of a global recession was less than 10 percent.
